Taming the Beast
by Evil Cosmic Triplets
Summary: Juice is haunted by memories from the past and a family curse that has been passed down from generation to generation. He's the first male to be 'cursed' with what his mother calls a 'gift', and he thought that he'd put the past behind him for good, but has he?


**Disclaimer:** I do not own the characters of this work of fiction that have been created by Kurt Sutter (my own characters would probably rather not have me claim them); no profit, monetary or otherwise, is being made through the writing of this.

**A/N:** Does feature death of characters that you do not know, a liberal interpretation of a legend, the creation of a word by adding a suffix to suit my purposes. This was written in response to the hc_bingo square: unwanted transformation. This involves the concept of 'mating' and features slash (non-graphic). It is also highly unrealistic, and a little on the 'dark', angsty side.

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He wakes up as though from a nightmare, gasping for air, and disoriented. He's panting and sweating. His limbs are twitching, and he hurts. It feels like his skin's been flayed. He's been turned inside out, heart beating outside of his ribcage.

And he's naked, though he distinctly remembers wearing sweats and a hoodie to bed, because being at Tina's is like staying at the North Pole, the woman cranks the air up to negative below zero. Usually they go back to his place, or stay at the clubhouse, but tonight she'd invited him over to her place, and he'd gone. The sex was always good, always left him feeling limber and aching in places he didn't know could ache.

But this time it's different. He feels stretched taut, like the wires of a piano. The ache's still there, but it makes him nauseous, and kind of reminds him of something that happened when he was thirteen – heart hammering in his chest, skin slick with sweat, and smelling like the inside of a sewer on a hot summer's day. Neighborhood rats skinned and drained dry of blood. Waking with the taste of blood – rich and cloying – in his mouth. Teeth, tongue, lips stained a guilty crimson.

The sense of urgency – his mother waking him early, before his step-father got up. The feeling of terror – tugging on his arm, she'd forced him under the cold spray of the shower. Blood sluiced off him in copper-brown streaks, and he'd watched in mute fascination as it swirled, counterclockwise, down the drain, and his skin had come clean, pink beneath the icy downpour.

"Chupacabra," his mother had murmured, cradling his head between her breasts. And he'd breathed of her, the scent heady and dizzying, as she'd rocked him, until his step-father woke, saw, and did his best to beat the weakness out of him, tearing him from his mother's warm, comforting embrace.

_Chupacabra_, the word leaves a bitter taste in his mouth – blood and cigarettes; decay and rotting flesh – his step-father's dead body, bereft of blood, lying, eyes open, unseeing, on the yellowing linoleum floor.

Juice remembers feeling cold, hollow and sick. He remembers how the salty scent of blood lingered in his nostrils, and how he could still taste it on his tongue – syrupy and like copper – and feel the blood, heavy, churning in his gut, for days afterwards.

When the police shook their heads at the mystery, and left, not bothering to launch an investigation because they knew that the truth would not be unearthed, and the man hadn't mattered, Juice had felt numb. Guilt gnawed at his chest, but his mother had kept him from saying anything.

His step-father been an abusive drunk, hadn't held onto a job for long, and had been in and out of jail since he was ten. Investigating his death would've been a waste of taxpayers' money.

Juice knows now, without having to look, that Tina's body, cold and clammy against his, is bloodless. He can taste the remnant of her blood in his mouth; metallic and brackish, it makes his stomach roil.

Her skin's translucent. Her veins, beneath the insubstantial layer of skin are black lines – like a charcoal drawing of trees, branches naked and thinned out in death. He knows, without turning his head, that her eyes, emerald green, are now a white shade of jade, the color having fled shortly after her death.

It's a curse, this unwanted transformation that makes him into a monster. One that he's inherited from his mother's lineage. It's usually passed onto the women in his family. He, according to his mother, is the first male to be _gifted_ with it.

Juice has not been through a transformation since he was a teenager. His hormones had been all over the fucking place, and he'd had zero control over anything. The last time he'd become one of the damned, what many called chupacabra, was when he had killed his step-father. He'd learned to control it after that; had refused to become such a monster again.

Juice is almost afraid to look at Tina. Now that the adrenaline rush from his transformation has worn off, he's begun to shiver, violently. Tears burn in his eyes, and he can't see straight.

He'd thought it was over, that he could control the urges, the desire to _change_ when life got that out-of-control feeling that it so often had nowadays. The last time he'd almost lost it, he'd tried to hang himself, but he'd fucked that up. Or maybe the beast inside of him hadn't allowed it. According to his mother, they were known to have supernaturally long lifespans.

Juice, though, doesn't want to live forever. Hell, he doesn't want to live through the rest of the night, knowing that Tina's blood is coursing through him, nourishing him, and that_ this_ could happen again, probably will and maybe his next target will be one of his brothers: Chibs or Happy or Jax or Bobby, or anyone.

His stomach clenches, twists, and he slides to the floor, landing on his knees, scraping them on the wood. He doesn't pay attention to the pain in his knees; it is secondary to the impending transformation, because apparently the beast isn't done with him yet. It needs more blood.

There's a churning in his gut, and it fucking hurts, feels like he's being torn in half. A scream claws its way out of his throat as his bones are set on fire, and the skin is stripped from his flesh. He can't recall ever being cognizant of the change before. He's only been conscious during the aftermath, coming to in the presence of blood and death and pain.

Just when he thinks that he won't survive, that this transformation will be the death of him, it's over. Gone is the pain, and the horror over realizing that he'd killed Tina. His senses are heightened tenfold and he can smell death; doesn't like the stench of it. Tina's flesh, already rotting, stinks – it is overly sweet and makes him queasy.

He casts a look at her, tilts his head to the side and then is mesmerized when he catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror that, earlier, he had used to watch himself fuck Tina, like a voyeur. His widely set almond-shaped eyes are a glowing orange, red – the breath of a dragon – and he is drawn to the beast in the mirror, wanting to establish a kinship with it. With a familiar.

Juice blinks, his heart is hammering in his chest. He's trapped, fascinated, trapped, fascinated, trapped, inside the beast which is looking at itself with longing. He isn't sure what to do, not sure he can control the pull of the beast, the desire it has to find a suitable mate, and he thinks he remembers his mother mentioning something about that back when he was a kid and still denying that he was different from all the other boys in his neighborhood. He hadn't wanted it then, and he sure as hell doesn't want it now.

The beast is narrowing its eyes, even as it approaches the mirror, touching the smooth surface, and pulling its hand back as though burned. 'Strange,' it thinks, 'Mate?'

It touches the mirror again, and it hurts, Juice hurts, because the beast knows that what it sees in the mirror isn't real, that it's being deceived. That there is nothing within or behind the mirror. It's all alone, and even Juice, its human host, is rejecting it.

Juice raises taloned hands to his ears when a heartrending howl is loosed from deep within him. It's loud and jarring and makes Juice's head feel like it's splitting. He backs away from the mirror, shaking his head. The reptilian scales that line his back seem to shift and change color in the light of the moon as they are reflected off the surface of the mirror. It's dizzying, and spellbinding, and Juice cannot move as his eyes are drawn once more to his reflection, and he gazes, with horrific wonder, at the beast that he's become.

No longer afraid, Juice takes a good, long look at himself in his cursed form. What he's become is not beautiful. It's ugly and scaled and furred. He looks like the offspring of some failed science experiment where a lizard was mated with a dog.

He's of two minds – one primitive, and focused on finding a suitable mate (a companion), like his mother had told him it would be when he reached his mid-twenties; the other, logical, and strangely detached now that he's decided to no longer fear what he is.

A shift in perception takes place when Juice begins to move from denial to acceptance. While he's not completely of one mind, there is a sense of shared awareness. Juice is no longer just Juice, and the beast is no longer a separate entity. They are twinned, and Juice wonders if, when he takes human shape, the mind of the beast will remain with him.

He turns to look at Tina's body. Naked, her arms and legs akimbo and stiffening with the onset of rigor mortis, she's the picture of beauty even in death. Yet, she hadn't been 'mate', which is why she's dead, and why he's transformed for a second time this night. It isn't lost on him that there is a full, harvest moon out. Something else his mother had mentioned, but he'd forgotten until now.

His head swivels abruptly to the left as a sound diverts his attention from the dead Tina to the dark shadows which lie just beyond her bedroom window. He crawls to the window, talons scoring the faux wood floor. His tail switches back and forth in agitation; the serrated spikes slice into the walls and send chunks of plaster flying.

He pries the window open, gouging the wall with his hook like nails, and splintering the wood of the windowsill in his wake. He sniffs at the air, and his nose wrinkles as a familiar scent burns his overly sensitive nostrils– cigarette smoke, whiskey, and some unknown spice.

As nimble as a cat, he slips out through the window, landing softly on all fours. He crouches low, listens for the space of several heartbeats, and absentmindedly swipes at a bothersome mosquito with his tail as he waits for the source of the noise, and the familiar scent, to reveal itself. It doesn't take long, and when the figure of a man rounds the corner of the house, Juice shrinks back into the shadows, cloaking himself within the darkness.

He lies in wait, red eyes burning with bloodlust, his heart thudding in anticipation of what is to come. Juice feels the beast's gaping maw turn upward in what must be a gruesome smile. He wishes he could see it. That he'd thought to smile while he'd been regarding himself in the mirror, because now that he's accepted this, he wants to know everything there is to know about what he becomes when he can't keep the transformation at bay.

The spikes along his spine tingle and ripple as he shivers. The man, someone he knows, is within grasp of his claws. Saliva, hot and reeking of rotting blood, drips from his fangs. It sizzles and pops when it hits the ground.

"Juice?" the man whispers. His neck is craned upward, and his hands are cupped around his mouth.

"Juice," he says louder, and then he grabs a rock and tosses it up toward the window. His brown furrows when it sails through the open window rather than tapping against it.

"Hey, Juice, you there lad?"

_Chibs,_ Juice supplies the name of his friend to the beast, and his heart skips a beat. He blinks, sniffs the air, and watches as Chibs moves beneath the light of the moon. His movements are sure, and elegant.

Juice can hear the other man's heart beat, and he knows that his friend is unafraid, but puzzled. The scars on Chibs' face deepen when he frowns as he calls out, "Juice," and is met by silence.

Juice knows when Chibs first becomes aware that he's not alone, because the man's heart judders in his chest and then it starts beating like mad. Chibs is afraid, though he doesn't know why, and it makes Juice's stomach quiver in expectation.

When Juice takes his first tentative step toward his friend, throwing off the shadows and letting the moonlight reveal him, he grins. Chibs stands there, frozen in place, his mouth open in an unvoiced scream as Juice circles him, first one way, and then another.

Juice snaps his teeth in the other man's face, just inches from his nose. He's toying with him, but Chibs doesn't know it. The man stands still, barely breathing, and Juice revels in the power that he has over the other man.

Chibs swallows convulsively, and, captivated by the pale swathe of skin laid bare by the moonlight, Juice drools, letting the toxic spittle dribble down his chin, and onto the grass where it crackles and spits. Juice wraps his tail around Chibs, pinning the man's arms to his sides, and squeezes until he can feel every labored breath that his friend is taking. Juice matches Chibs inhale for inhale, exhale for exhale, and then he peers into the other man's eyes.

Chibs' heart rabbits at first, and the stench of fear, cloying and intoxicating, rolls off of him, masking the scents that Juice has come to associate with the other man. Juice catches the reflection of his eyes in Chibs', and it frightens him, because he can see what Chibs is seeing – tiny red flames flaring to life, licking at the surface of dark, soulless eyes.

It gives him pause as he raises a claw, and, instead of slicing into the man, Juice traces the edge of one of Chibs' scars with it, causing the other man to shudder. Chibs stills and holds his breath when Juice leans in, jaw clacking shut, so that he can sniff the other man. The stink of fear is driving Juice mad, and his nostrils flare. He wants this smell, this awful stench to stop, because he wants a return of the familiar scent of cheap cigarettes, whiskey and spice – he wants Chibs, not a quivering mess of fear-filled pheromones.

He tilts his head so that he is once more staring into Chibs' eyes. Though he doesn't know what he hopes to see in them, Juice doesn't like it when Chibs tries to look away, and he places the sharp tip of a talon beneath Chibs' chin, forcing him to look, to see.

After what feels like a short eternity, Chibs' heartbeat slows down to something resembling normal. He relaxes, just a little, and he squints. His dark eyes dart back and forth as though he's trying to work something out, and then he does the strangest thing, he smiles.

Uncertainty causes Juice to falter, and his tail loosens its grip on Chibs, allowing the other man to move his arms, and take a step away. But, once free, Chibs doesn't run, and that's what saves his life, because Juice isn't wholly Juice, and prey is prey, friend or not. The beast demands blood, needs it, and Chibs' heart is healthy. The blood flowing through his veins is aromatic and stirs something inside of Juice, making his mouth water and his loins tense in expectancy.

Instead of fleeing, Chibs turns to face the beast, and raises a shaking hand to Juice's scaly cheek, touching him. The touch, light and tender, sends a spark through Juice and he leans into the touch.

"Juicy?" Chibs questions, his voice is filled with awe.

Juice huffs in acknowledgement, and he nods. The movement, though slight, displaces Chibs' hand, and causes him to fall on his ass. Juice reaches down to help Chibs up, but accidentally slices his friend with one of his nails, and blood, black in the incandescent light of the moon, quickly seeps from the deep wound in the man's forearm.

Horrified, Juice cries out, and turns away from Chibs. Distressed, his tail furls and unfurls around his waist, and he squats down on his haunches. He feels a hand, warm and comforting, on the back of his shoulder and turns his head.

Chibs is looking at him with a mixture of curiosity and something else that Juice doesn't understand. The overwhelming stench of fear is gone. But it's replaced by blood, sharp and fragrant – irresistible.

"It really is you, in't it?" Chibs asks.

Juice nods.

"Beautiful," Chibs breathes out the word, touches Juice's elongated jaw with a finger.

Juice stops breathing, stops thinking, and lets the beast, his cursed self, take over, because the word, 'Mate,' is being screamed at him, and it's giving him a headache, and he can't think straight anyway. 'Chibs – Mate.' As Juice disengages from reality, it's like he loses consciousness, and time, and he's just gone.

Countless hours later, Juice wakes up as though from a nightmare. It feels like he's trying to swim to the surface of a very deep lake, and gasping for air. He's disoriented, panting and sweating. His limbs are twitching, and he aches. It feels like his skin's on fire. He's been torn asunder, and he's almost certain that his heart is beating outside of his ribcage, but this time he remembers, and his heart stops beating entirely, because Chibs had come looking for him at Tina's when he hadn't answered his cellphone.

He's naked and cold. The bed sheets are scratchy, unfamiliar. _Not Tina's_, he thinks, and he wonders if he dreamed he whole thing – the unwanted transformation; the blood, thick and warm coursing down his throat; Tina, dead; and Chibs, the man's body warm and pliant and willingly writhing beneath his.

But this is different. He feels sated, and whole. The ache's still there, but it's somehow satisfying – an ache associated with good sex.

Juice is afraid to turn over. He doesn't want to face whatever he did in his altered state. Because, if Chibs really did find him, and he really did engage in animalistic sex with the man, Juice is certain that the man is either dead, his life's blood pooling in the pit of Juice's stomach, or that the man is livid with him.

A soft moan pulls Juice from his thoughts, and he instinctively flips over, fingers finding and entwining their way into Chibs', even as he pulls the man to himself and wraps himself around him. The man's alive, and Juice just breathes of him, grateful not to smell fear. The wound that Juice had left on Chibs' arm is nothing but a thin, white scar, and Juice wonders how the hell that happened.

"You healed me," Chibs says after a pause, and his voice is scratchy, as though he's either spent a good portion of the night screaming or he hasn't used it in a long time.

"Uh," Juice isn't sure what to say.

He doesn't really remember much of anything that happened after he'd accidentally cut Chibs with one of his talons. A few images, disjointed and somewhat disturbing, stumble their way to the surface of his mind. But, they can't possibly be true, because if he'd really done what the images in his head had insisted that he'd done to Chibs, it is a wonder that the both of them had survived the last few nights.

"Fuck." Chibs tilts his face upward so that he can look Juice in the eye. "You don't remember it, do you?"

Juice shakes his head, feels shame and fear welling up in his stomach.

"Not all of it," he admits.

"'S'okay," Chibs assures him, patting his thigh. "Police think what happened to Tina was an animal attack, guys do too."

"And," Juice swallows around the lump in his throat, "what about…this?"

"You mean us?"

Juice clears his throat, but can't think of the right thing to say. He's terrified, and not because he fears that he'll be kicked out of the club, but because of what he might've done to Chibs, how he might've hurt him. Juice knows that he won't be able to handle it if Chibs rejects him, just as he'd rejected his own heritage when he'd gone through his first transformation.

"Jax almost lost an arm when he tried to take me away from you," Chibs says after a pause.

"Shit."

Chibs chuckles, the sound rumbles and vibrates in his chest. "It was a sight to behold, that's for sure. Never in a million years…"

"I'm sorry," Juice says, and he shifts to disentangle himself from Chibs, and free the man.

He's fully prepared to leave the Sons – Chibs – and go out on the highway, like Bruce Banner, to try and find a cure for this, because he doesn't want to kill and suck people dry. He doesn't want to force himself on anyone, ever again, like he must've on Chibs, but Chibs refuses to let go. If anything, he holds on tighter, drawing Juice even more securely around himself, like he's a fucking cocoon.

"Relax, I and the guys can't even pretend that we understand what the fuck is going on, but we ain't kicking you out of the club, and there ain't no way in hell that y're leaving me behind, thinking that you did something to me that I didn't want," Chibs says, and the look in his eyes tells Juice that he's telling the truth.

"Family curse," Juice says softly. "Some people call it, what I become, a chupacabra, my mom called it a gift. First time it happened, I was just a kid. After I, the beast, killed my step-father, I kept a tight rein on the beast, and until recently, I thought I had it under control."

Chibs looks at him long and hard, and there's something like understanding in his eyes. "Yeah, and apparently I'm your mate. Kind of slipped out shortly after you shifted the last time."

Chibs laughs when Juice gives him a puzzled frown, and then he pats his thigh again. "Don't know about you beastly boy, but I'm still recovering from our 'mating'. What say we get some sleep, talk about this later?"

Juice yawns, his eyelids feel heavy, and he wonders at the power that Chibs' words seem to hold over him. He realizes that he can't keep his eyes open, and just lets them fall shut. He still has a thousand questions for Chibs, such as how the hell he can be so calm about all of this when he himself is freaking out, and he's known about this curse since he was a little boy.

But, the pull of sleep is impossible to resist, especially with the feel of Chibs' body pressed flush against his own. Chibs sighs, rubs his hand up and down Juice's thigh, and places his lips to Juice's throat and kisses him.

"Mate," the word is nothing more than a contented sigh as it passes across his lips.

Juice, with the sound of Chibs' breathing evening out, and surrounded by the scent of the man that had dared to stand down, and tame the beast, falls asleep.


End file.
